MovieChat Forums > Dark City (1998) Discussion > Stranger Oddity...

Stranger Oddity...

posted 10 years ago by amadaca
7 replies | jump to latest

How do you suppose the initial abductions occurred? It would seem to me the Strangers, in their original form, would be hard-pressed to physically kidnap Humans (of course, we could presume they had some wild technology with which to snatch people up). I find the presence of animals amusing in this movie. Did the Strangers go around collecting mice, goldfish & a bunch of oscars, as well as people? What of the cockroach in Wolenski's room? Surely this is the descendant of a stowaway --- a roach who boarded the alien craft without their knowledge. Such things have happened here on Earth enough times. I cant imagine a species stealing other beings for the grand purpose of survival bothering to chase roaches through an apartment, can you?

I notice the Strangers are referred to by some as parasites, is this a fair description? We only see the Strangers inhabit DEAD bodies, & there is no implication that they do (or can) parasitise living creatures. We dont consider Hermit Crabs parasites, do we?

[–] sploiter 10 years ago

Are the people in DC reanimated dead or are they UFO abductees?

[–] amadaca 10 years ago

The ones used by the Strangers are re-animated dead (the Strangers appear to be electrical organisms, so re-animating a corpse would seem plausible), but the main characters & city inhabitants are well & truly alive.

[–] Freddyfan951 10 years ago

I'm sure the Strangers would have had the technology to abduct humans. And perhaps some of them killed a few of the first to be abducted to use their bodies, or took over the ones who happened to die on the way to their constructed city.

[–] acombe 9 years ago

Technically Hermit Crabs are Parasites

[–] GreatWhiteApeofBarsoom 9 years ago

In the novelization, the Strangers inhabit a distant world that starts dying when an alien lands there and starts drastically changing their home environment. Later, another group of aliens lands on the planet. The Strangers pounce and take over the newly landed aliens, using their technology to escape certain death.

It's not explicitly stated, but we can assume the Strangers then used the aliens' technology to come to Earth and abduct enough people to fill their city, providing them with test subjects for their experiments and bodies to conduct the experiments in.

Requiescat in pace, Krystle Papile. I'll always miss you.

[–] wormholeboy 8 years ago

Wow, I wasn't aware of the novelization, but I'm pleased to see that I independently came up with a fairly similar explanation relating to the Strangers' travels. There's an exchange in the film prior to Mr. Book being imprinted that mentions imprinting has always failed for the Strangers, which caused me to conclude that the best explanation for their possession of the technology would be having obtained it from some other alien race that they encountered at some point in their travels.

[–] soonerpike697 9 years ago

They can make them sleep on command...